Friday, July 25, 2014

District
23-Acker School held classes from 1872 until May 17, 1963.Like many other districts in Geary County,
the lines actually crossed the county line to include parts of Dickinson
County. When the school closed in 1963 there were 15 students; the next year, 13
began attending school in Chapman and 2 moved from the district.

The stone building bearing the school’s name
and district number above the door is located at the corner of K-18 and Milford
Lake Road North and was built in 1911.The
stone school was erected by the Holmgren Brothers with stone from the quarry near
Spring Valley School. At the time, the stone school cost $2500. The stone
building, now a private residence, was not the first building to house Acker
School children.

Acker
began as a frame building in 1872.The
first building was moved to the Acker farm in 1911 when the stone structure was
erected. The Acker family used the old frame school building as a wash house
and butcher house, hopefully not at the same time.The Acker family home burned in 1931 and the
family moved into the frame building they eventually remodeled.

Acker
was not the original name of the school.Originally, the school was called Harmony Hill.After 1917 the name gradually changed to
Acker because the family was prominent in the community. Acker School held
classes for over 90 years, and prominent families from Geary County spent their
formative years within its walls. Altweggs, Gfellers, Hildebrands, Johnstons,
and of course, Ackers all attended the school.

In
the Altwegg family history it’s noted that the younger Altwegg children
attended Acker School.The family spoke
Swiss, as they were recent immigrants, and so the children had to learn their English
in school.Their schoolmates called them
the Dutch kids.Instead of feeling
discouraged, the children stayed in school, learned the language, and earned
their schoolmates’ respect.

Country
schools taught a wide array of subjects and they did it all in one room. Children
were expected to do their lessons, keep quiet, and behave themselves.Punishments were quite different from now,
and included paddling.According to the
students, the worst day of the year “was when Jane Roether [superintendent of
schools] would come to each school in the county and give tests. This was the
most dreaded day of the year,” (Wayne Gfeller, 2010.)

If
you look at the list of students with the photograph you’ll notice a number of
the names are repeated.Imagine going to
school and being in the same room as all your siblings and cousins all day.While this would have been nice because you’d
never walk to and from school alone, it could also be bad because if you acted
up at all your mother was sure to find out.

According
to Gfeller, it wasn’t all hard work and strict rules. “There were times set
aside for field trips. During the eight years at Acker School I remember
visiting the JC fire department, Geary County Sheriff Department, KJCK radio
station, Coca-Cola Bottling Company, [and] Shellhouse Bakery.” (Gfeller, 2010.)

At
the closing picnic for Acker School more than 100 people attended and Mrs.
Clarabelle Endsley, the final teacher, said, “The end of an era has come. Next
fall most of the pupils residing in the Acker community will attend Chapman
Elementary School. The one room rural school has served its purpose well over
many years and it is not without regrets that it is put aside with the changing
times.”(Union, May 28, 1963.)

Acker School-2013-Private Residence

Do
you have a one-room schoolhouse story or memory you’d like to share? We are
looking for stories of your own or your family’s experiences to include in the
tour. If you have an amusing, interesting, or important story you would like to
share with us please call or come by the museum. You can also write it down and
send it to us at 530 N. Adams, Junction City, KS 66441 or GearyHistory@gmail.com.

Friday, July 18, 2014

This county’s love of
baseball has spanned nearly 150 years.This city has seen amateur leagues, little league teams, professional
leagues, army teams, and farm teams.There is no doubt that Geary Countians love their baseball.

The love of baseball
began when Junction City’s first ball club was formed in 1867.It’s unknown what field these gentlemen
played on, but the Weekly Union reported that for the team, to “become an
organization of which Junction City may justly, feel proud it needs only close
application to, and strict observance of the rules of the game, together with
the highest respect for any and all officers who may be chosen from time to
time.”

By the 1890s there were
numerous teams in Kansas and it seems in 1895 that there was a decent rivalry
between the Junction City team and that of Enterprise.In 1895 the Republican felt that, unlike the
team in 1867, the Enterprise boys were not behaving in a manner befitting ball
players. The Junction City team lost to the Enterprise team and the paper quipped,
“The Junction City team still preserve their good name and honor. The bruisers
and bummers at Enterprise can keep the $25 and with it employ some one to teach
them a grain of common decency.”

During the 1890s
baseball fever was rampant and parties of fans, tally-ho parties, would gather
and ride a stage or wagon to other towns to watch the Junction City team play. The
Republican reported, “a tally-ho party was made up Tuesday and those composing
the party all started for Enterprise with gay and joyous hearts to see the
bloody battle.”

Milford Ball Team circa 1900

By the 1920s baseball
was well established in Geary County and there were teams across the county and
in the different cities.Milford,
Wreford, the Union Pacific, and other areas all had their own teams. There was
a ball field along Grant Avenue where the teams played until Rathert Field was
completed in 1937.

The Y ballpark was
located about halfway to Ft. Riley by the Union Pacific Y near the shops.According to Keith Hemenway, “The open air
street cars would pull on to a side track, to load and unload the fans.” For years this field was not supported by
funding from a Junior League as later fields were.Milton Clark, a longtime Junction City
baseball fan remembered that the players would chip in money every week so they
could buy the ball for Sunday’s game, and “on Sunday morning everyone would be
at the ball grounds with rakes and hoes to clean the field” before the
afternoon contest.

Y Ball field along Grant Ave near Union Pacific Y

Geary County was lucky
and during World War II a number of pro-ballplayers played on the Army team:
Archie George played for the Browns, Joe Garagiola played for the Cardinals,
Harold Reiser played for the Brooklyn Dodgers, and Alpha Brazle played for the
Boston Red Sox.

Geary County has even
had a few home grown people go on to play professional ball.George Giles played for numerous Negro League
teams in the 1930s and Joey Devine was drafted and played for the Atlanta
Braves from 2005 to 2011.

Baseball season in
Junction City is nearly over, and we all wish the season would last just a few
weeks longer so we can watch the Brigade from the green wooden bleachers of
Rathert Field.While enjoying the games
at Rathert it can be easy to forget that we’re sitting on a piece of
history.Rathert Field was a WPA project
in 1936 and 1937 and has been the venue for professional and historic teams
like the Kansas City Monarchs.

So this summer as
you’re sitting down on the bleachers or in front of the TV to watch a game,
remember that your love of baseball has deep roots in Geary County and that
fascination with America’s Favorite Past Time has been shared by its citizens
for 150 years.

Friday, July 11, 2014

“There
is nothing better than to come in from a hard day and find a letter waiting. Of
course, I never get enough because letters from home are so welcome.”

-Bill
Insley, 1945

Tucked
away in attics, closets, and basements throughout this country are millions of
letters written by men and women who have served in the armed forces. There are
also countless e-mails being written by active duty troops serving in countries
throughout the world right now. These letters are an irreplaceable record of
the sacrifices made by military personnel and their families.

Many
of these letters are also historically significant, offering eyewitness
accounts of famous battles, historic events, or encounters with prominent
military leaders. But even the more personal correspondences, such as heartfelt
expressions of affection or words of support and encouragement between
separated loved ones, offer valuable insight into the wartime experience.

Geary
County is a community with a long history of military involvement. Families
from this area have sent sons and daughters into the military from the founding
of Geary County in the 1800s to the present day, and the letters and souvenirs
they sent home helped their family and friends, and now us, connect to their
wartime experiences.

Delivery
of mail was particularly vital during both World War I and II, and soldiers and
the army as a whole relied on letters to keep up morale. Receiving well wishes and gifts from home was
one of the few comforts a soldier had on the Western Front. The majority of
them spent more time fighting boredom than they did the enemy, and writing was
one of the few hobbies available to them. For some, it was a welcome
distraction from the horrors of the trenches and battlefields.

V-Mail Packaging during World War II

During World War II, wartime mail
became too much for the Post Office to send between the soldiers stationed abroad
and their family at home, but because it was such a vital part of morale
upkeep, the War Department looked for new ways to get letters to their
soldiers. As a way to cut back on the
bulk, a new type of mail rose: V-Mail. Short for Victory Mail, V-mail was a
unique type of messaging system. Soldiers write on standardized stationary, the
letter was censored, and then microfilmed. The microfilmed letter was shrunk
down, shipped overseas and then magnified and reprinted on American soil. By
using V-mail, the postal system saved huge amounts of shipping space, and the
37 mail bags required to carry 150,000 one-page letters could be replaced by a
single mail bag.

V-mail sent by Artie O'Donnell

Letters from serving soldiers had
a powerful role, not just in keeping families informed of the well-being of their
loved ones; they also helped to sustain popular support for the war across the
home front. So, while mail was
encouraged between soldier and family, censorship was a serious issue during
both World War I and World War II.In
part this was a way to prevent the enemy finding out secret information, but it
also prevented bad news from reaching the home front and lowering national
morale.

Artie
O’Donnell, the son of local doctor Art O’Donnell, mentioned this challenge in a
letter to his brother, “…maybe I’ll be able to fill this letter out with news
about that, Lord knows that with censorship and all that we have to go thru,
its darn hard to think of anything worthwhile to write about…” Artie knew that
each letter was read and censored by the army before it was mailed, a stamp
placed on it to show that it didn’t reveal any important information. If the
censor felt that too much was said, the words were either blacked out or
physically cut out before the remainder of the letter was sent, which meant
that a soldier had to be very careful about what he said!

Whether the soldier was on the battlefield at
Gettysburg, in the trenches of World War I, or in the jungles in Vietnam, the
mail service has long provided serving men and women with a way to connect to
their loved ones. And now at the Geary County Historical Society, we are sharing
local military stories through their personal letters written to and from the
war front.

Stop by the Geary County Historical
Society to see our new exhibit “Letters Home,” now open! See examples of V-mail
and censorship, read letters of hope, fear and love written by our local
soldiers from 1890-1990 and then tell us where your soldier has been. Open
Tuesday-Sunday, 1pm-4pm, admission is FREE.

Geary County Museums

The Museum is open Tuesday-Sunday 1-4 and is closed for holidays.There are three floors of exhibits, both permanent and rotating. We have a wonderful gift shop where you can buy trinkets for yourself or others. The Museum building is available for rent, email for more information. We have three Satellite sites available upon request.